Orsisius

Venerable Orsisius (Horsiesios, Arsisios) was an Egyptian monk and writer of the fourth century, the third abbot of the community founded by Saint Pachomius the Great at Tabennisi. He was the author of the Book of Orsisius, a testament for monks. He is commemorated on 15 June.

Life

Nothing is known of his origins and youth, but he was probably born around 300. With Venerable Theodore he was a direct disciple of Pachomius the Great, coming to the monastery around 320. After the sudden death of Pachomius from plague, in 346 (according to an English source, 348), there was a brief crisis over succession in the union of monasteries. Two years earlier Pachomius, gravely ill, had named Theodore, who came to the community in 328 and had authority among the monks, as successor. But, recovered, he gave Theodore a penance, since the elders' enthusiasm to accept him as successor seemed to him excessive. Although it appears that Pachomius's attitude to Theodore softened by 346, before his death he named as successor a certain Petronius, a rich landowner recently received into the community.

Petronius died two and a half months later, of the same epidemic, and named as successor Orsisius of the Chenoboskion monastery, also recently joined. According to the Life of Pachomius, Orsisius himself did not wish this post. The monks openly showed their opposition, and he handed leadership to Theodore and withdrew to the cenobium at Chenoboskion. After Theodore's death, in 365 (or, according to another source, around 380), he took over leadership of the Tabennisi monastery again, advised, according to one source, by Saint Athanasius. He died after 386, around 400.

Writings

His main work, the Book of our Father Orsisius, which he gave dying to the brotherhood as a testament, is mentioned by Gennadius of Marseilles in chapter nine of On Illustrious Men: Orsisius the monk, a colleague of Pachomius and Theodore, learned in the Scriptures, composed a book full of divine instruction for all monastic discipline, in which nearly the whole Old and New Testaments are explained in short dissertations insofar as they concern monks. The original is not preserved, only the Latin translation by Saint Jerome, Doctrine on the institution of monks, printed in the Greek Patrology. Other writings are partly preserved in Coptic: seven Instructions, the last of which is not considered authentic, and epistles, mostly collections of texts from Scripture. In 1972 two unknown epistles of his were discovered, together with one of Theodore, among the manuscripts of the Chester Beatty library in Dublin. It is said that Theodore and Orsisius helped Pachomius in composing his rule.